FLOSS Weekly Episode 766: WebRTC — The Hack That Connects Everyone To Everything

This week Jonathan Bennett and Dan Lynch talk with Sean DuBois, WebRTC wizard, all about the crazy feats the Pion Go server is capable of, how WebRTC is about to change OBS, and what it looks like to build a successful Open Source Career.

WebRTC is for more than video. The TOR Snowflake project uses Pion to sneak TOR traffic through firewalls even with Deep Packet Inspection (DPI) at play. Since nobody wants to block web conferencing, TOR and even Wireguard can use this to slip though.

Sean is also working on some game-changing patches for OBS Studio, including WHEP support to go along with the newly introduced WHIP feature. This enables direct connections to another OBS client, as well as connection to another WebRTC client like vdo.ninja without running an embedded browser to make it work.

And then there’s WebRTC For The Curious, a free CC0 e-book all about the nuts and bolts of WebRTC. And Broadcast Box, a ready-to-run WebRTC one-to-many broadcasting solution that lets you run your own streaming service. You can connect with Sean at the Real-time Broadcast Discord server for information about all of the projects listed here and more!

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Hackaday Podcast Episode 252: X1Plus Hacks Bambu, Scotto Builds A Katana Keyboard, And Bass Puts Out Fire

This week, Editor-in-Chief Elliot Williams and Kristina Panos met up to discuss the best hacks of the previous week. It’s CES time once again in Las Vegas, and you know what that means — some wacky technologies like this AI pet door that rejects dead mice.

Then it’s on to What’s That Sound, which Kristina managed to nail for once. Can you get it? Can you figure it out? Can you guess what’s making that sound this week? If you can, and your number comes up, you get a special Hackaday Podcast t-shirt.

But then it’s on to the hacks, beginning with a new keyboard from [Joe Scotto] and an exploration of all you can do with an LED strip, like 1D fireworks and roller coasters without any moving parts. From there, we marvel at the ability of sound waves to extinguish flames, and the tech behind life as a quadriplegic. Finally, we examine not one, but two of Jenny List’s finely-crafted rants, one about web browsers, and the other about the responsible use of new technology.

Check out the links below if you want to follow along, and as always, tell us what you think about this episode in the comments!

Download and savor at your leisure.

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FLOSS Weekly Episode 765: That Ship Sailed… And Sank

This week Jonathan Bennett and Aaron Newcomb talk with Randal Schwartz, the longest running host of FLOSS Weekly, Perl’s biggest cheerleader, and now Dart and Flutter expert. What’s new with Randal since his last FLOSS Weekly episode in May 2020? Why should you look at Dart and Flutter? And how do you avoid becoming a security martyr?

Randal has been busy since handing over the reigns of FLOSS Weekly, adding to his Perl credentials a solid claim to being a Dart Flutter expert. The Dart language has some real appeal, taking the best features from JIT languages like JavaScript, and also offering binary compilation like a real systems language should. Then the Flutter framework lets you write your code once, and literally run it on any screen. Sure, there have been some growing pains along the way, and listen to the episode to hear Randal describe the “45-degree turns” the language/framework duo has taken through the years.

Then as almost a bonus at the end of the episode, Randal quickly covered his now-expunged conviction for “doing his job with too much enthusiasm”, and covered some basic pointers to keep other security researchers out of trouble. This week is a nostalgia trip for long-time listeners, as well as a real treat for everyone else.

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Hackaday Podcast Episode 251: Pluto, Pinball, Speedy Surgery, And DIY GPS

Welcome to 2024! This time around, Elliot and Dan ring in a new year of awesome hacks with quite an eclectic mix. We kick things off with a Pluto pity party and find out why the tiny ex-planet deserved what it got. What do you do if you need to rename a bunch of image files? You rope a local large-language model in for the job, of course. We’ll take a look at how pinball machines did their thing before computers came along, take a fractal dive into video feedback, and localize fireworks with a fleet of Raspberry Pi listening stations. Ever wonder what makes a GPS receiver tick? The best way to find out might be to build one from scratch. Looking for some adventure? A ride on an electroluminescent surfboard might do, or perhaps a DIY “Vomit Comet” trip would be more your style. And make sure you stick around for our discussion on attempts to optimize surgery efficiency, and our look back at 2023’s top trends in the hardware world.

 

Grab a copy for yourself if you want to listen offline.

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FLOSS Weekly Episode 764: You Have To Be Pretty Cynical

This week Jonathan Bennett and Katherine Druckman talk with benny Vasquez, chair of AlmaLinux, all about the weird road we’ve been on with Enterprise Linux distributions, and how that’s landed us here, where we have AlmaLinux, Rocky Linux, and multiple other Red Hat downstream distros. What’s the difference between those projects, and why does it matter?

Projects need more than just developers. How do you keep members doing documentation, bug hunting, outreach, and even graphic design plugged in and feeling like part of the team? How do you walk the narrow line between the different directions a project can drift, setting up your community for long term success? And where’s the most surprising place benny has found AlmaLinux running? And why is benny’s first name never capitalized? Give this week’s show a listen to find out!

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Hackaday Podcast Episode 250: Trains, RC Planes, And EEPROMS In Flames

This week in the Podcast, Elliot Williams is off at Chaos Communication Congress, hearing tales of incredible reverse engineering that got locomotives back up and running, while Al Williams is thinking over what happened in 2023. There’s a lot of “how things work” in this show, from data buoys to sewing machines to the simulated aging of ICs.

Whether you’re into stacking bricks, stacking Pi Picos, or stacking your 3D prints to make better use of precious bed space, this episode is for you. Enjoy.

This is your last chance to download a new podcast this year. Take it!

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FLOSS Weekly Episode 763: Fedora Fixes Everything

This week Jonathan Bennett and Dan Lynch talk once again with Neal Gompa of Fedora, CentOS, openSUSE and more. This time the focus is Fedora, with sprinklings of Immutable Linux, KDE 6, and the new Linux stack of Pipewire, Portals, and Wayland. Neal gives us a rundown of what exactly makes Fedora Atomic so interesting, and why you probably don’t want it running on your desktop. But in a computer lab, or on a public machine? Fedora Atomic might be exactly what you need.

Up next there’s Pipewire, the userspace sound server that replaces Pulseaudio and Jack. Should we think of Pipewire as Jack 3.0? And what’s the secret to getting really reliable low-latency performance for Pipewire in Fedora? It might not be what you expect.

There’s a popular rant online, that Wayland breaks everything. And for years, that’s been a relatively accurate statement, in that Wayland hasn’t been ready for prime-time. Fedora 40 has gone all in on the belief that Wayland’s time has come, with KDE and Gnome no longer having an X11 native option. It’s Wayland all the way. And as one that has run Rawhide, I can say that the future there is bright. Literally, if you have an HDR capable monitor.

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